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Biographical information

Ananias Wesley Loudermilk, or Lowdermilk, was born 21 Jan 1821 in Randolph County, North Carolina. Ananias was the son of Stephen A. Lowdermilk and Mary Ann Graves. He grew up in a large family with 10 siblings. They lived in Asheboro, North Carolina, but moved with many other Piedmont families to the state of Indiana. The family settled in Jackson Township in Clay County. As a young man, Ananias became a route agent[4]. He studied law, served as a teacher, and became Clay County Treasurer at 39. He was one of the founding settlers of Ashboro in Sugar Ridge Township.

Ananias Loudermilk in historical records

Biography in History of Clay County

From History of Clay County by William Travis, Volume I, page 294:

Ananias W. Lowdermilk, native of North Carolina, born in Randolph county, January 28, 1821; came with his parents to Clay county in his boyhood, the family locating in Jackson township, where he helped clear up and provide a homestead. At the age of twenty-three years he procured the position of route agent on the New Albany & Salem (now the Monon) Railroad, running between New Albany and Lafayette. While at home on a few days’ vacation he was taken out on the night of the 23d of September, 1854, by the so-styled “regulators”[5], (said to have been masked) and lynched in a grove of scrub-oak timber near the present residence of Mark Parkins, west of Prairie City. At an early hour Sunday morning he called at the residence of Mrs. Robertson, mother of T. M. Robertson, of Brazil, who lived on the road a half mile south of what is now Prairie City, his plight in evidence of the treatment to which he had been subjected, without hat, coat or vest. He ate breakfast with the Robertson family and related to them what had taken place. After his leaving to go back to his home a party of several of the immediate neighbors went from the Robertson place to the scene of the violence perpetrated, as reported, finding the missing clothing at the foot of a tree, and observing that the ground had been well tramped over, with evidence of horses having been tied up to small trees. What cause or excuse the mob had, if any, for this act of lawlessness and inhumanity, seems to have passed from memory, if ever known.

Subsequently, having read law, when the town of Ashboro was founded as the prospective county-seat, he was one of the first to buy ground within the plat and build, with the view to engage regularly in the practice. On the death of County Treasurer Elias Helton, November 30, 1860, Mr. Lowdermilk was appointed by the board of county commissioners to fill out the unexpired term. He was one of the early teachers in the public schools of Jackson township, and for a number of years a member of the fraternity known as Independent Order of Odd Fellows, in which he had attained the fifth degree, held the rank of past grand, had served a term as presiding officer and had represented his lodge in the grand lodge of the state of Indiana. He died on the last day of the month of December and last day of the year 1871, aged fifty years and three days.

Clay County Advocate article on the "lynching"

From the Oct & Nov issues of the Clay County Advocate published in Bowling Green in 1854:
Wed. Sept. 20,1854
Judge Lynch
On Saturday night last A. W. Lowdermilk, Route Agent from Greencastle to New Albany, was taken from his bed at his residence in this county, at an unreasonable hour of the night, and "lynched" in a most cruel and unmerciful manner. The cause for such a procedure against Mr. L. we have not learned. What with tearing down reservoirs, buring out feed, __ dams, administering lynch-laws, and the ladies stopping the liquor traffic, it will be readily conceded that ours is an industrious and progressive community.

Note - Mr. Lowdermilk was not lynched as it was retracted in the Sept. 27 issue. However, later issues reveal there were questions if he was the best person for the job and also question as to how he got the job.